Funding Student Support Services Based on Headcounts
Part 4 in a series analyzing proposals being considered by the NSHE Committee on Higher Education Funding. These articles delve into various proposals the Committee will consider on May 30 and finalize on July 25. The NFA has issued a set of fundamental Principles for Funding Higher Education.
A valid criticism of the current funding-distribution formula, which allocates state appropriations using resident Weighted Student Credit Hours (WSCHs), is that it does not account for students from diverse backgrounds and part-time students needing wrap-around services. Several of the presidents have proposed using headcounts instead of WSCHs to distribute funding. HCM Strategists, the committee’s consultant, recommend using headcounts for only a portion of the formula.
In part 2, we showed that a complete switch from WSCHs to a headcount distribution formula would have disastrous consequences for multiple institutions. In this article, we analyze cost estimates for student services based on advisor-to-student ratios and recommend that funding for student service expenditures be tied to a student headcount measure.
Achieving a 350-to-1 Advisor-to-Student Ratio
NSHE's service standard for student services is one academic advisor or counselor per 350 students. Table 1 provides a cost estimate for funding that many advisors system-wide.
Table 1. Estimated cost of academic advisors and counselors
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Total Student Headcount (Fall 2023)
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107,000
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Advisors at 350-to-1 students-to-advisor
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305
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Compensation per advisor ($56K average salary + 35% fringe + 11% FY2025 COLA)
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$84,400
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Total Cost
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$25,700,000
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The total cost of about $25.7 million represents 2.7% of the total budgets of the seven NSHE colleges and universities.
Enhancement for At-Risk and Students: Closing the Achievement Gap
Another goal is to enhance funding for services to at-risk students, including underrepresented minorities (URM), Pell Grant recipients, first-generation students, English-language learners, and students needing disability accommodations. NSHE data indicate 63% of students or 67,000 are historically minoritized and 32000 are Pell-grant recipients (data for the other categories are not readily available). The calculations in Table 2 show a cost of about $18.5 million overall to provide additional advisors or other program staff to support these students at the same 350-to-1 ratio as regular academic advisors.
Table 2. Estimated cost for additional support personnel for at-risk and underrepresented students (at a 350-to-1 student-to-staff ratio)
Student Services Expenditures
Funding advisors and support personnel is only a portion of student services. We can examine current expenditures attributed to Student Services for the colleges and universities. The NSHE Operating Budgets classify expenditures using standardized functional categories. Table 3 shows percentage expenditures for the NSHE colleges and universities for 2021-2022. The overall expenditure for Student Services is 8.0% of the budget, varying from 5% for UNR to 14% for NSU. Student Services include not only academic advising, but a wide range of services and programs beyond classroom instruction including information technology.
Table 3. 2021-2022 Expenditures by Functional Categories
A correlation analysis (Table 4 in footnote) shows that institutional expenditures for Instruction, Academic Support, and Operations & Maintenance are most highly correlated with Weighted Student Credit Hours. In contrast, expenditures for Student Services are most highly correlated with Total Fall Headcounts. Thus, the institutions are already allocating resources to serve students outside of the classroom in proportion to headcounts. The left side of Figure 1 shows that institutions are spending similar amounts on Student Services per student ($644 overall). The right side shows, in contrast, that the two comprehensive universities spend a much smaller portion of their budgets (5 to 6%) on Student Services than do NSU and the community colleges (11 to 14%).
Figure 1. Student Services Expenditures by Institution
As discussed in Part 2 of this series, a complete switch for the distribution formula from Weighted Student Credit Hours to headcounts would result in huge disruptions of funding. However, distribution by headcounts for up to the current 8% of expenditures for Student Services would be reasonable and would account for a variety of support services and technology infrastructure.
Recommendations
NFA recommends that Student Services expenditures (approximately 8% of the formula-funded budgets overall) be carved out from the resident WSCH distribution formula individually for each institution and that those amounts be distributed using an average of Fall and Spring resident headcounts. In future budgets, these headcount allocations should be updated through caseload maintenance items in the state budget process, plus an adjustment inflation. Because current Student Services expenditures are highly correlated with headcounts, this change would not cause a major disruption in funding, but it would allow for growth in services to students based on headcounts rather than student credit hours, accounting for part-time students who predominate at the community colleges.
Additionally, the headcounts should be enhanced for underrepresented minority, Pell recipients, and other identifiable at-risk or underserved students (without double counting individual students) by a factor sufficient to fund an additional counselor or other program officer per 350 of those students (roughly 0.25 to 0.30). Because the current formula does not account for these students in any way, this funding should be implemented as a enhancement. Once funded and implemented, the enhancement of headcounts for at-risk students acts as a performance factor–recruiting and retaining those students would boost future funding.
NFA also recommends that all reporting by the institutions of student credit hours, headcounts, and other factors that go into the funding formula should be audited regularly. The formula should provide incentives to serve students, not incentives for creative accounting.
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Data are sourced from NSHE public records and reports. We welcome questions and welcome corrections from authoritative sources. Contact:kent.ervin@nevadafacultyalliance.org.
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Table 4. Correlation Analysis of 2021-2022 Institutional Expenditures in Major Functional Categories
NFA Series on NSHE Funding Formula
